Job Opportunity – Grower

We’re looking for someone to take on the role as our lead grower at Left Field market garden. This will involve all aspects of the day to day management of the site including following and developing the growing schedule, delegating tasks, and all associated planning and administration. You’ll get a lot of help with this to start with but then left to it.

About Left Field Market Garden:

We’re are fast entering our third growing season on our 2.5 acre site which sits overlooking Glasgow on the outskirts of Neilston, 8 miles from our shop. The site was formally in conventional agriculture producing mostly barley. Two years rest from this and the adding of organic material is showing improvements to the soil which is slightly acid, clay and quite stony.

Site Facilities and Equipment:

The site has a fairly large 2 span polytunnel measuring approximately 16m x 32m, a shipping container which acts as tool store, and a caravan which which has been used for WWOOFERS and as a staff bothy. The site has a single tap water supply and no electricity.

We use almost exclusively hand tools with the more exotic of those including broadfork, osculating & collinear hoes and an Earthway Seeder. At the time of writing we’re awaiting the arrival of a BCS 2 wheel tractor with rotary plough and power harrow as well as a quick cut greens harvester.

Site Layout:

The polytunnel is made up of 7 raised beds which we aim to keep in year round production. Outside there are three main outdoor ‘fields’ which we have laid out into 30m x 75cm beds. This year we have also planted a soft fruit garden which so far includes 200x blackcurrants and 200 x rhubarb, we want to expand this over time. Additionally we have 30 fruit trees, mostly apple, which were planted just over a year ago. We also have a small area of community plots which are looked after as allotments by folks who made a donation to our recent crowdfund campaign. The remainder of the site is made up of grazing area for our flock of chickens and ducks which total about 120, and pen for our Berkshire sow and litter/s.

Crop Plan:

We have a crop plan in place for this season which includes legumes, roots, alliums, brassicas and cucurbits over our outdoor field areas. This is planned out over a 6 year rotation which we are in the first year of. Outdoors we are looking to grow 18 types of vegetable in total with several varieties of some. In the tunnel we’re currently focusing on quick greens with some nightshades. More planning is required on planting the tunnel crops beyond mid-summer.

Our Markets:

The market garden produce goes primarily into our veg boxes which we deliver across Glasgow and wider west-central Scotland, as well as into our shop, gluts being sold to other independent retailer as and when. The emphasis of production on the site is to meet more of the needs of the market we hold, particularly growing things that can not be sourced locally, benefit from being really, or have a high value. We also want to focus on season extension, particularly filling the traditional hunger gap in spring.

Other Info:

We’re currently in our first year of conversion to being certified organic.